Gandhi's spectacles missing from ashram

The iconic pair of round-framed glasses of Mahatma Gandhi has gone missing from a museum in Sevagram Ashram in Wardha district of Maharashtra.

Ashram staff while cleaning articles in a museum noticed that the glasses were not there among the other belongings of Gandhiji.

Gandhiji established the Sevagram Ashram in 1936 and stayed there for several years. The Quit India resolution calling for independence was also passed in Sevagram in July 1942.

About three lakh visitors visit Ashrama annually and the ashram will celebrate its platinum jubilee later this week on June 15-16.

“The spectacles might have been stolen some time back but came to light only when the cleaners could not find the glasses in the display case,” Aakash Lokhande, the manager of Sevagram, told Press Trust of India news agency on Monday

The spectacles were among a number of personal items, including a pen stand and a bathroom brush, on display.

Gandhiji’s daughter-in-law Nirmalaben, donated the spectacles to the ashram.

Wardha superintendent of police S.M. Waghmare said he had visited the ashram in the morning and inspected the area.

In 2004, India's first Nobel Prize medal won in 1913 by renowned Bengali poet and author Rabindranath Tagore was stolen from a museum in the state of West Bengal.